Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski

Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski (1 March 1899-8 March 1972) was an SS Obergruppenfuhrer under Nazi Germany during World War II.

Biography
Erich Zelewski was born on 1 March 1899 in Lauenberg, Pomerania, German Empire to a family of Kashubians. In 1925, he Germanized his name with "Von dem Bach", and in November 1941 he removed the Polish-sounding "Zelewski" from his name. Bach-Zelewski fought with the Freikorps in the Silesian Uprisings after serving in World War I and served as a member of the Reichstag from 1932 to 1944, joining the SS of Nazi Germany and taking part in the Night of the Long Knives. During Operation Barbarossa in 1941, Bach-Zelewski exterminated the Jews of Riga and Minsk, and in July 1943 he took command of an anti-partisan unit that killed 35,000 civilians in Riga and 200,000 in Belarus and eastern Poland. That same month, he was given supreme command over all anti-partisan activities in Belgium, Belarus, France, Poland, the Netherlands, Norway, Ukraine, and Yugoslavia during World War II, and in August 1944 he massacred 200,000 civilians during the Warsaw Uprising. On 1 August 1945, he was arrested by US military police after trying to leave the country, but he never faced any trials for war crimes and died in 1972 in Munich, Bavaria.